This WordPress.com site is the cat’s pajamas

Monthly Archives: February 2014

I apologize for any typos. I am typing this on my mom’s ipad. I am visiting her in Naples Florida and in a “Mommy-Brain” moment I forgot my computer at home.

So, about the Premiere. You know what, after all that worrying (nails bitten town to the quick) I had a great time! The cast and crew were all happy to see each other and the audience was filled with people that supported the project And the show was well-received. Oh, and I felt beautiful – there’s always the ‘Beauty Piece.’

In preparation for the Red Carpet I got a spray tan (75 dollars), got my hair straightened and professionally curled (85 dollars), bought a new dress (400 dollars) and got my makeup professionally done (250 dollars.) You should know I cant afford this! But fear made me do it!

When you get your pictures taken on the red carpet those pictures end up on the internet and are linked to you forever. I was scared into trying to look my best.

And after all that primping I felt really beautiful. (Confession: even more beautiful than I felt at my wedding.) I felt like a sexy woman again and not just a mommy. But, (there is always a but…)

What really made the night fun was being with friends. We drank (I pumped and dumped) and danced. We laughed and took whacky photos in a photo booth.

I started to think that the people who were happy to see me would have been happy to see me with less makeup on and with my natural curls.

And maybe, just maybe, they weren’t secretly judging me for being bigger than usual.

On the way home my husband said to me: “Everyone told me how beautiful you looked tonight.”

“Goal accomplished.” I thought. (The goal being to look beautiful.) But a little voice inside my head said: “One day you’ll be older and people might not comment on your looks (no matter how much you spend on clothes, makeup, hair and spanks…) Are you ready for that day?

Its hard to write a blog where the theme is ‘body image’ without sounding self-centered.

And vain… And shallow…

I wonder: do we worry so much about how we look because its easier than worrying about the more difficult/complex problems in the world? For example, why are we worrying about our weight when we ‘should’ be finding a solution for the situation in Syria?

I admit, I often feel powerless when it comes to fixing things out there in the world; there is so much corruption. And some problems seemingly have no solution… But I’m also scared that if I do get involved in trying to fix something really ‘dark’ (child sex trafficking for example) something bad will happen to me. I’m scared to go there (mentally, emotionally and physically.) But surely that’s what we are meant to do: tackle the big problems. Leave the world better than how we found it.

I’m just putting this out there as a sort of disclaimer: I do want to make a difference with this blog, with you, with our little community that is interested in freeing women (and men) from the pressure to look perfect. I just hope this beauty pressure counts as a ‘big’ problem and I’m not getting this ‘wrong.’

After interviewing hundreds of women around the world there is no denying that women are spending hours every day worrying about how they look. Imagine what could we achieve if we replaced that time worrying about our appearance with other more productive thoughts: would women write and enforce better laws, would women come up with brilliant solutions to very difficult and complex problems, would the world be a better place?

And would it be scarier to be judged for what we are doing rather than how we look?

I think its time for me to research women making a difference in the world and get inspired. Hopefully, their strength and bravery will remind me that women are capable of incredible things, that I can be brave, that you and I can help to fix the big, scary, hard problems – even though we are constantly being told that our real purpose in life is to be beautiful. x

P.S. I googled ‘Amazing Women’ and look what came up in images… Is it any wonder some of us get confused and feel afraid?

This is a girl I know (see picture below.) She is friends with friends of mine and she’s always been very sweet to me whenever I’ve run into her. I am in no way trying to bring her down with this post. I simply want to speak about how her feature makes me feel.

Ashleigh is one of the most genetically gifted women I know because she looks like we are told women are supposed to look like, naturally.

She won the genetic lottery.

I’m sure if you asked her she would tell you there are things she doesn’t like about her appearance but I’m guessing she doesn’t know what it feels like to look totally wrong/ totally counter to what society tell us woman ‘should’ look like.

Her Hive magazine feature, which she posted on Facebook, is about being fashionable when you are pregnant. Ashleigh has long been singled-out as a fashion/style expert.

If you are a stick then your body lends itself way more to fashion, because fashion is created for sticks. I often wonder if these ‘style icons’ fall into being style icons because its easier for them to wear clothes. If you are short and curvy you have to hunt far and wide for clothes that ‘work’ on you; its not so easy to rock all kinds of trends.

And how about a world where pregnant women don’t have to look extremely fashionable? Or, if you believe they should wear great outfits, how about these types of features about stylish pregnant women celebrate a wide range of pregnant body-types? None of my other gorgeous, great-dressing non-stick pregnant friends have ever been asked to be in a ‘fashion-feature,’ coincidence?

The line from her article:”confidence is key” annoys me to no end. Again, she is a lovely girl but if I was pregnant at a party, and pregnant Ashleigh showed up rocking pumps, a mini skirt and stick-thin cellulite-free legs, instantly, I wouldn’t feel very confident because she would be meeting the “criteria” put forward by the media for what is “beautiful and hot” while pregnant and I would not.

The more attention Ashleigh gets for her ability to look good in clothes (pregnant or not) while at the same time we aren’t seeing an equal amount of coverage of other body-types being celebrated, the more we are stuck in the same damn place: a world where one type of girl/woman is being celebrated and the rest are made to feel inadequate.

(My point is not that Ashleigh shouldn’t be celebrated: She is gorgeous, a nice person, a good friend and mom. My point is simply that we need to see more variety so the standard for what looks good changes.)

WTF! I am the only mother in New York that hasn’t lost the baby weight! At least that’s how I feel after doing my first ‘Mommy and Baby Dance Class’ with James today. I kid you not, the other mothers of 4 to 7 month-olds in the class are skinnier than I was before I got pregnant! I’m a size four right now but next to these Mamas I’m obese. Yes, I have had the odd terrible moment post-delivery of scarfing down three chocolate bars in a row, but I also eat a lot of salads! I swim twice a week, walk the dog, I’ve done some jogging and I exercised when I was pregnant…Yet, I am miles away from my pre-baby weight. In fact, getting changed before the dance class today I was shocked by my own reflection in the mirror – Its true what they say: “your body really does change with pregnancy.” OR DOES IT?! How have these mothers managed to stay a size zero – or double zero, triple zero!? Doctors tell you that you should gain on average 25-35 pounds during pregnancy, so what’s the deal? Ok, it is possible to loose 24 pounds in 6 months if you’re loosing a pound a week but are these new moms dieting? I’m breastfeeding so the idea of dieting kind of scares me: what if I don’t get enough calories or nutrients for my baby? Some doctors even recommend you eat a couple hundred calories more when you’re breastfeeding. So if these mamas are loosing the weight through breast-feeding they must not be taking in those extra calories. But then how are they starving off the hunger!?? Breast-feeding makes you hungrier and exhaustion makes you crave carbs so being a new mom on a diet requires super-human strength! Why am I so weak when they are so strong!? In class today, instead of being fully present and enjoying dancing with my gorgeous son, I spent too much time noticing my reflection in the class mirror. I couldn’t help grimacing at my saddle-bags, disliking my juicy thighs and feeling all that extra padding around my middle bounce on the off-beat. Worst of all, I felt like a failure. I felt like a failure because these other mamas clearly had more self-discipline than me meaning they would achieve more in life, resulting in them having more fulfilling lives. They were clearly better wives than me (because they looked hot for their husbands way before I did) and they hadn’t let pregnancy overtake them the way I had. I’d throughly enjoyed being pregnant because it was the first time in over a decade where I felt like I didn’t need to be skinny or hot. My life before baby had been about looking good (especially being an actress.) When I was pregnant it was so much easier to justify not worrying about my looks and frankly, it was very freeing. Now I wonder, did I do right? Should I have thought more about how I looked? Is gaining weight during pregnancy (and taking a year to loose it) passé?? Mamas? Daddys? Thoughts?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5_D0rdqeAs Please click the link to watch a new show I’m involved with. I play Amanda (and I wrote a little bit on the pilot.) My husband Tim Piper directed, his partner Daniel Rosenberg produced, and they both wrote it (along with Jeremy Pikser and Mike Dieffenbach!) The guys from Chipotle are some of the nicest guys around – they are the real deal! Hope the show makes you laugh! If you look into it, you will be shocked by what some Industrial Farms do!